Perhaps the most avidly collected toys of all are mechanical banks. Simple cast
iron banks with no animation were first manufactured just after the Civil War. With
the development of spring mechanisms, many intricate and ingenious models appeared.
Mechanical banks flourished between about 1870 and 1910. In this example, dated
1906, a coin is placed in the gun; when the lever is pressed, the coin is shot into
a slot in the tree trunk and the bear's head springs up. The toy is derived from
a famous event: Theodore Roosevelt, on a hunting expedition in Mississippi, refused
to shoot a bear cub. The cartoonist Clifford Berryman was present and immortalized
the incident in the next day's newspaper; thus, the "Teddy bear" was born. This
bank was made by the Steven Company Iron Foundry of Cromwell, Connecticut.